Random Drug Testing of Students Proving To Be a Popular Idea

Drug testing of students appears to be gaining momentum on several
fronts across the country.

The Miami-Dade County school board this month approved with
modifications a pilot program in which any high school student could be
randomly chosen for drug or alcohol testing. Some critics dismiss the
program as symbolic because students must give their consent to be
tested, but it is spurring consideration of similar policies
elsewhere.

Last
week, Lt. Gov. Gray Davis of California, who is seeking the Democratic
nomination for governor, called for public schools to adopt random drug
testing of students when parents agree.

Meanwhile, a federal appeals court this month upheld the
constitutionality of an Indiana district's random drug testing of
students who participate in any extracurricular activity.

The Rush County, Ind., program goes beyond the drug testing of
student athletes upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court in its 1995 decision
in Vernonia School District v. Acton.

'Feel Good' Policy?

In Florida's 342,000-student Miami-Dade County district, the
nation's fourth-largest school system, the board last fall approved the
development of a drug-testing program. The initial plan, which called
for random testing of high school students whose parents consented in
advance, met with objections from the American Civil Liberties Union of
Florida.

The program approved 7-2 by the school board on Jan. 14 still
requires parents' advance consent, but it also provides students the
right to refuse to be tested.

The board allocated $200,000 for the pilot program, which is
expected to cover random tests of about 5,000 of the district's 83,000
high school students.

Once a student is chosen, the district will notify his parents and
ask them to take the student to a designated testing facility within 24
hours. Only parents will learn the results of the test. The district
will not be notified, and students who test positive will face no
discipline from the school.

One Miami-Dade board member who voted against the program criticized
it as a "feel-good policy."

"It's a public relations ploy," board member G. Holmes Braddock said
during the meeting.

Andrew H. Kayton, the legal director of the ACLU of Florida, said
the program was little more than a "symbolic gesture" that would not
help combat illegal drug use.

But an aide to the school board member who proposed the policy
defended it by saying it will give parents whose children refuse to be
tested an alarm that the students may be using drugs.

"The students know that at any time their parents could pick them up
after school and say, 'Guess what? I was called today by the school and
you are being tested this afternoon,'" said Luis Martinez, the aide to
board member Renier Diaz de la Portilla.

The Miami-Dade testing program could begin sometime in March, Mr.
Martinez said.

Extracurricular Ruling

Legal experts believe the number of districts that have student
drug-testing policies remains relatively small. But the Supreme Court's
1995 Vernonia decision motivated many districts to at least
consider testing of student athletes.

In the 6-3 Vernonia ruling, the court cited student athletes'
status as role models and their need for physical well-being in
upholding the Vernonia, Ore., district's policy of random urinalysis.
The court also held that the district's policy was justified by a
perceived increase in drug use by some student athletes.

Since the ruling, a number of districts have adopted testing
programs that include all students who participate in extracurricular
activities. Indiana's 2,800-student Rush County district adopted such a
program in 1996.

Parents of several children who had participated in the Rush County
High School library club, the Future Farmers of America, and as an aide
to the football team refused to consent to the testing program. They
challenged the program as a violation of the Fourth Amendment's
prohibition against unreasonable searches.

A federal district court ruled for the school district, and the U.S.
Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit upheld the ruling on Jan. 12.

A three-judge panel of the appeals court ruled unanimously in
Todd v. Rush County Schools that drug testing of all
extracurricular participants was a reasonable extension of the
Vernonia ruling regarding athletics.

Notice: We recently upgraded our comments. (Learn more here.) If you are logged in as a subscriber or registered user and already have a Display Name on edweek.org, you can post comments. If you do not already have a Display Name, please create one here.

Ground Rules for Posting
We encourage lively debate, but please be respectful of others. Profanity and personal attacks are prohibited. By commenting, you are agreeing to abide by our user agreement.
All comments are public.